It’s a common practice around the world to speed up TV shows in order to insert more commercial time. The subtle speeding up can slice a couple of minutes from a 22 minute sitcom with little noticeable difference–and broadcasters can plug in two more minutes of commercials per half hour! It’s a last ditch effort, perhaps, to extract money out of a dying media delivery system before streaming obliterates the advertising model. TBS does it with Seinfeld reruns (see below) and worldwide it happens all the time–from the BBC to India.
But is that all there is to it–trying to make more money? Actually many viewers point out that TV shows (and everything else) move faster now in the age of the 6-second Vine. The speeding up actually helps the content itself seem more contemporary. Here’s one commenter: “Honestly, shows move a lot faster now and the sped up version feels a little more updated than the original slower version. But who even watches actual TV anymore? No TV + adblock on 90% of internet = very little advertising = happy me :)”
